GRAPHIC: LAWSON PARKER, NGM STAFF. ILLUSTRATIONS: MATTHEW TWOMBLY, NGM STAFF
SOURCE: NASA HISTORY PROGRAM OFFICE. PHOTO: ITAR TASS/AP IMAGES
Male
Female
Tourist
Single-mission career
Multiple-mission career
OR
Dots represent instances
of people in space.
For each individual:
1963 Valentina Tereshkova's
three-day trip set the rst milestone
for women in space. Others are
highlighted in the time line.
Who's Been to Space?
If not for Dwight D. Eisenhower, sailors and mountain climbers
might have been among the first Americans lofted into space.
That's because NASA initially considered asking a variety of
people with high-risk occupations to apply for the astronaut
corps. But the U.S. President made the call: Astronauts had
to be military test pilots, who in 1959 were all men.
The doctor who designed the astronaut screening exams
wondered how women would fare. "The thinking was, the Mer-
cury capsule is small, so why not have smaller people inside?"
says NASA historian Bill Barry. Thirteen women passed unofficial,
privately funded tests in the early 1960s. Nearly two decades
later NASA accepted its first female astronauts. After 2000
civilians started undergoing training to fly as space tourists---
including a circus clown, Cirque du Soleil founder Guy Laliberté.
Now, as eyes turn toward Mars, experts are asking how humans
will weather interplanetary treks. Among the issues: radiation
exposure, bone loss, and faster aging.
---Victoria Jaggard
Shannon Lucid
(1996) First U.S. woman
to live on a space station
Eileen Collins
(1995) First female
space shuttle pilot;
(1999) first female
shuttle commander
(2007) Peggy Whitson
holds the spacewalking
record for a woman: 39
hours, 46 minutes, spread
over six space walks.
(2007) Sunita Williams
holds the female record
for longest single
mission: 195 days.
(2003) Space shuttle Columbia
disintegrates during reentry,
killing all seven crew members.
(1986) Space shuttle Challenger
breaks apart during takeoff,
killing the crew of seven.